In 1945 the four Allied states conducted war crimes trials of the Third Reich’s surviving political and military leaders.  Though some advocated simple executions a decision was made instead to send a message about the post-war rule of law.  In spite of widespread doubt that this would be anything but a “show trial” based on victor’s justice, several of the defendants were acquitted.  Although the other powers did not participate in subsequent trials in Nuremberg, the United States decided it was important to treat other ardent Nazis who were indicted for war crimes in a similar orderly fashion.

The most famous of the other trials was that of 23 Nazi doctors and bureaucrats who were implicated in human experiments in concentration camps.  What was expected to be a case that could be completed in a few weeks took months, because the defense argued that there were no internationally recognized rules for the conduct of human experiments.  Ultimately the court returned to the grounds for the prosecution case, which was murder and other outrages against human beings, not the violation of research ethics.  As a result of the “doctors’ case,” the judges decided that part of their decision should be a corrective to the apparent absence of international rules.  That document has come to be known as the Nuremberg Code.

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Image: By Adrian Pingstone (talk · contribs) – Self-photographed, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=327144

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